The rumours, which are published in Lord Ashcroft’s Call Me Dave book, include reports Cameron was a member of a “dope smoking group”, called the Flam Club at Oxford. But initiation rituals and depraved behaviour are nothing new when it comes to university societies.

From dressing up as members of the Ku Klux Klan and drinking other people’s vomit, to downing pints of live goldfish and being paraded down the street with Tesco bags over their heads, students have repeatedly hit the headlines for their lewd antics.